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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25936381">patrick darling</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkissedstar/pseuds/sunkissedstar'>sunkissedstar</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Newsies (1992), Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Backstory, Child Neglect, Childhood Trauma, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Mother-Son Relationship, Past Character Death, Running Away, i understand that i shove jack in every single one of my fics but i also don't care, some of y'all don't have projection characters and it really shows</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 05:46:15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,778</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25936381</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunkissedstar/pseuds/sunkissedstar</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Finch wasn’t scared of many things. Brooklyn made him a little jittery, but you could ask any newsie in a fifty-mile radius and they would say the same thing.</p><p>He wasn't afraid of spiders or horses or heights. He wasn’t afraid of anything. But one day, when a woman came in through the lodging house door in the pouring rain and pulled her hood off her face, he couldn’t help the jolt of fear that went racing down his spine. <br/>~<br/>After five long years away from home, a familiar woman comes to find Finch at the lodging house. A thousand memories come back at once.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>patrick darling</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>hey what's up i'm super depressed but i'm still here to provide content for your covid days</p><p>trigger warning: small mention of past death, running away</p><p>this is based off the scene in newsies 1992 where a mother is looking for her son. it's a headcanon in the fandom that Finch is the kid she's looking for, so that's what this is based on. enjoy!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Finch wasn’t scared of many things. Brooklyn made him a little jittery, and so did the cops and the Refuge, but you could ask any newsie in a fifty-mile radius and they’d say the same thing.  </p><p> </p><p></p><div class="">
  <p>He wasn’t afraid of spiders or horses or heights. He wasn’t afraid of anything. But one day, when a woman came in through the lodging house door in the pouring rain and pulled her hood off her face, he couldn’t help the jolt of fear that went racing down his spine. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What’re lookin’ at, kid?” Jack asked, clapping him on the back and startling him more than he’d like to admit. Finch jumped away from the doorway, leaning back against the wall and taking a deep, shuddering breath.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Somehow, he forced a coherent sentence out of his mouth and gestured to the front door.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“There’s… there’s a lady,” Finch said, ignoring the shiver in his voice as his fingers started tapping restlessly on his hip. “Just came through the door. She’s lookin’ at Kloppman’s book, the one we sign into when we’re stayin’ the night.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack nodded and moved towards the doorway, but he paused to look Finch over, his eyes flickering from his hyperactive fingers to the hat Finch had pulled low over his face. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You okay?” Jack said carefully. “You know her or somethin’?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Yeah, I’m fine,” Finch snapped. “Just… just tired. Get her outta here and leave me alone.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The true meaning behind his words, <em>“Get her to leave me alone,”</em>went unsaid, but it was there, hanging out in the open whether Jack knew it or not. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Finch propped himself against the wall as Jack ducked inside the main entrance. Mindlessly, he pulled his slingshot out of the waistband of his pants and pulled at it, hearing it snap sharply against his fingers.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“What can I do for you, ma’am?” he heard Jack say. Finch could imagine him leaning against Kloppman’s desk, trying to appear like he knew what he was doing. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The woman spoke, and her voice rooted the fear deeper into Finch’s feet. He wasn’t sure why he was still standing there, why he wasn’t booking it for the stairs and hiding in Jack’s penthouse, but it had something to do with the frozen chill shrouding his body, cementing his feet to the spot.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I need to speak to the adult that runs this home,” the woman said. Her voice was gentle and firm all at once, the sort of tone only a mother could have. “Please. It’s important.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Sorry, ma’am,” Jack said. “Old Kloppman’s retired for the night, but I might be able to help you. You lookin’ for a kid? I know all these idiots better than they know themselves. If they’re here, I’ll bring them up front.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Except that was a lie and Jack knew it. They’d had something like this happen before; a few years ago, Romeo’s father had come storming through the door in the dead of night, drunk and angry, like he’d pound the poor kid given the chance. He managed to insult Crutchie and lunge at Race before Jack pushed him out the door, claiming Romeo was in Brooklyn.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack would never hand a kid over without batting an eye. This wasn’t the damn Refuge and he was determined to keep it that way.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The woman sighed. “His name is Patrick.” Her voice was tight with worry and stress, like she was carrying the world’s weight on her shoulders. “He’s… I lost him when he was ten. He should be fifteen now. He was tall when he…” She lost the momentum in her voice, and the silence that settled over the room was so thick Finch thought he would keel over from the guilt raging in his stomach. “Brown hair. Green eyes, like… like mine.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack’s silence was almost as heavy as hers. “Your boy, ma’am?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Please, honey…” Finch risked a peek around the corner of the doorway, showing no more than the tufts of his hair. The woman was holding Jack’s hand in both of hers, tears in her eyes and cheeks flushed red. “Do you know him?”</p>
  <p>Slowly, painfully, Jack drew his hand out of hers and awkwardly patted her arm. “Let me… a lot of my boys go by nicknames. I don’t know all their real names,” he lied. “I’ll ask around. Stay here, I’ll have one of my boys bring you some water.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He turned to the doorway and Finch ducked away. He retreated to his spot on the wall, feeling his shallow breaths build up quicker in his chest until they were coming in short, harsh gasps. A hand settled on his shoulder, another one went to his face, and a voice murmured close to his ear. </p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Upstairs, now.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack didn’t sound angry, but his tone left no room for debate. Finch’s legs were like jelly as Jack moved his hand to the small of his back and pushed him to the stairs. He was still snapping his slingshot.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He collapsed on Crutchie’s bed, the one he slept in when he wasn’t camping out on the roof. Jack knelt in front of him, and his hands went to their original place on Finch’s shoulders.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“That’s your mom, ain’t it?” Later, Finch wouldn’t admit the question made him gasp for breath all over again, and that Jack swore under his breath and had to take deep, exaggerated breaths to get Finch’s heart back to a steady pace.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Hey, hey, it’s okay… what do you want me to tell her, Finch?” was the next question; it wasn’t nearly as terrifying to hear, but that didn’t mean he knew the answer.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I don’t know,” he admitted, picking at the chipped wood of his slingshot. Jack had carved his name into the handle all those years ago, when he’d first shown up at the lodging house, confused and scared. He ran his fingers over the groove of the letters. <em>Patrick Cortes.</em></p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You wanna go with her?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Wanna tell me why?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack kept guessing anyway. “Did she hit you?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Is she going to hit you?”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“Starved you, locked you up, told you somethin’ you didn’t want to hear?” Jack said. He was running out of ideas, fingers tangling in his hair like Finch was a puzzle he had to solve.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“No.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack sighed and let his hand fall to his lap. Finch watched him smooth his hand over his knee, mind moving a mile a minute.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“You’re gonna have to tell me what’s goin’ on,” he said, frustrating lacing his tone. Finch knew it wasn’t directed at him; it was the fact that it was happening at all. “I won’t turn you over if you don’t wanna go with her, but I can’t help you if you don’t tell me why you have to stay.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Finch’s mouth opened and closed like a fish. He avoided Jack’s huge, worried eyes, guilt clogging his throat as he picked at the bedsheets. In all honesty, he’d spent the last five years of his life pretending he’d never run away from home; pretending his mother was a vague, distant memory and he’d never have to think about her again. It helped with the cold, empty thoughts late at night, when he’d stare out the window and count the stars in the sky, wishing he could go to sleep and never wake up.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>He didn’t remember much about running away, about ending up on the streets. He remembered Elmer’s jokes, Albert’s laugh, and Crutchie’s smile, but he couldn’t remember his mother’s warm embrace and her gentle eyes.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Not until she walked through the door of the lodging house, tearing down the walls he’d spent years building up and bringing a thousand memories back at once.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Finch didn’t realize he was trembling until Jack slid an arm around his shoulders. Finch leaned into him, and a single tear rolled down his cheek. He was quick to wipe it away.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I ran away when I was ten,” he said, no hint of a tremor in his voice. “I... I didn’t <em>want</em> to leave. My older sister died from a bad fever, and my mother was so miserable that she could hardly get out of bed. She never said it out loud, but we were only a couple dollars away from losing our apartment. She couldn’t afford to feed me, and I’d go days without eating so she’d have something at the end of the day, when she’d get home from work at midnight. I… it wasn’t her fault, but I couldn’t handle it. I didn’t want the hunger pains and staying awake all night listening to my mother cry. I didn’t want to see my sister’s empty bed.” Finch’s stomach twisted.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I just wanted a better life for me and for her, and I figured she would be better off if I was gone. I didn’t think she’d even miss me, as long as she had a roof over her head.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>His voice cracked on his last words, and Jack’s hand around his shoulders tightened. “I… I was just a kid, Jackie. I didn’t think about what it’d feel like to lose both her kids at once.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>The silence that followed was heavier than the strings on Finch’s heart. He could hear the rest of the newsboys in the common room downstairs, a million miles away, but all he could feel was Jack’s calloused fingers on his arm.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>“I know it hurts,” Jack said quietly, his voice like the drop of a pin. “I know that big brain of yours just wants to forget it ever happened, and I know you’ve spent the last few years doin’ that to protect yourself. Believe me, I get it.” He squeezed Finch’s shoulder once and let his arm drop. “I’d never make you go with her if you don’t want to. But… she just wants to see her little boy.” Jack briefly touched Finch’s face, a ghost of a smile on his lips. “There’s a lot I’d want to say to my mom, but mostly, I’d just want to put my arms around her. I think you want the same, kid.”</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Jack got up from the bed and left the room without another word. Finch watched him go; the room felt so much warmer than it had before.</p>
</div><div class="">
  <p>Later, Jack turned the corner and saw Finch out of the corner of his eye, holding his mother like a lifeline as she cradled his head like an infant in her arms. Jack smiled to himself and slipped out of the room, knowing his little brother would spend the night smiling at the stars in the sky.</p>
</div>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>yeah i wrote this at 2am but i hope you liked it anyway :)</p><p>please leave comments and kudos!! they make my day!! make sure to drink water and abolish the government, have an amazing day</p></blockquote></div></div>
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